A Translation of Part of Monsieur Fontenelle's Preface to the Memoirs of the Royal Academy at Paris , in the Year 1699. treating of the Usefulness of Mathematical Learning.
BUT to what purpose should People become fond of the Mathematicks and Natural Philosophy. Of what use are the Transactions of the Academy? These are common Questions, which most do not barely propose as Questions; and it will not be improper to clear them.
People very readily call useless, what they do not understand. It is a sort of Revenge; and as the Mathematicks and Natural Philosophy are known but by few, they are generally look'd upon as useless. The reason of this is; because they are crabbed and not easily learnt.
We have a Moon to light us in the Night; What is it to us, say they, whether Jupiter hath four? Why so many laborious Observations, so many tedious Calculations to know exactly their Course? They'll not afford us the more Light for it; and Nature, which hath plac'd these little Planets without the reach of our Eyes, doth not seem to have made them for us. According to this plausible Argument they ought not to have been observ'd with a